Страны, не имеющие выхода к морю: проблемы и зависимость от соседей.

Developing country without coastline
The landlocked developing countries (LLDC) are developing countries that are landlocked. Due to the economic and other disadvantages suffered by such countries, the majority of landlocked countries are least developed countries (LDCs), with inhabitants of these countries occupying the bottom billion tier of the world's population in terms of poverty. Outside of Europe, there is not a single highly developed landlocked country as measured by the Human Development Index (HDI), and nine of the twelve countries with the lowest HDI scores are landlocked. Landlocked European countries are exceptions in terms of development outcomes due to their close integration with the regional European market. Landlocked countries experience economic growth 6% less than non landlocked countries, holding other variables constant. 32 out of the world's 44 landlocked countries, including all the landlocked countries in Africa, Asia, and South America, have been classified as the Landlocked Developing Countries (LLDCs) by the United Nations. As of 2012, about 442.8 million people lived in these LLDCs.

The United Nations has an Office of the High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States (UN OHRLLS). It mainly holds the view that high transport costs due to distance and terrain result in the erosion of competitive edge for exports from landlocked countries. In addition, it recognizes the constraints on landlocked countries to be mainly physical, including lack of direct access to the sea, isolation from world markets and high transit costs due to physical distance. Delays and inefficiency compound geographically: thus a two to three week wait due to border customs between Uganda and Kenya makes it impossible to book ships ahead of time in Mombasa, furthering delivery contract delays. Despite these explanations, it is also important to consider the transit countries that neighbour LLDCs, from whose ports the goods of LLDCs are exported.

Although Adam Smith and traditional thought hold that geography and transportation are the culprits for keeping LLDCs from realizing development gains, Faye, Sachs and Snow hold the argument that no matter the advancement of infrastructure or lack of geographic distance to a port, landlocked nations are still dependent on their neighbouring transit nations. Outlying this specific relationship of dependency, Faye et al. insist that though LLDCs vary across the board in terms of HDI index scores, LLDCs almost uniformly straddle at the bottom of HDI rankings in terms of region, suggesting a correlated dependency relationship of development for landlocked countries with their respective regions. In fact, HDI levels decrease as one moves inland along the major transit route that runs from the coast of Kenya, across the country before going through Uganda, Rwanda and then finally Burundi. In fact, some LLDCs are seeing the brighter side of such a relationship, with the Central Asian nations geographic location between three BRIC nations (China, Russia and India) hungry for the region's oil and mineral wealth serving to boost economic development. The three major factors that LLDCs are dependent on their transit neighbours are dependence on transit infrastructure, dependence on political relations with neighbours, and dependence on internal peace and stability within transit neighbours.

Burundi has relatively good internal road networks, but it cannot export its goods using the most direct route to the sea since the inland infrastructure of Tanzania is poorly connected to the port of Dar es Salaam. Thus Burundi relies on Kenya's port of Mombasa for export; but this route was severed briefly in the 1990s when political relations with Kenya deteriorated. the Algerian civil war (1991–2002), the Sierra Leone civil war (1991–2002), the Guinea Bissau civil war involving Guinea (1999), the First Liberian Civil War (1989–1997), the Second Liberian Civil War (1999) and the First Ivorian Civil War (2002–2007). The lone exception was Ghana, which was under military rule but did not have an active civil war at the time. The Central African Republic's export routes are seasonal: in the rainy season Cameroon's roads are too poor to use; and during the dry season the Democratic Republic of Congo's Oubangui River water levels are too low for river travel. And though it is widely conceived that free trade can permit faster economic growth, Mongolia is now subjected to a new geopolitical game which concerns the traffic on its railway lines between China and Russia. Russian Railways now effectively owns 50% of Mongolia's rail infrastructure, which could mean more efficient modernization and the laying of new rail lines, but in reality also translates into powerful leverage to pressure the government of Mongolia to concede unfair terms for license grants of coal, copper, and gold mines. Thus, it can be argued that these nations with extraordinary mineral wealth should pursue economic diversification.

Nepal is another landlocked country with extreme dependency on its transit neighbour India. India does not have poor relations with Nepal, nor does it lack relevant transport infrastructure or internal stability. However, there have been two cases of economic blockades imposed by the government of India on Nepal – the official 1989 blockade and the unofficial 2015 blockade – both of which left the nation in severe economic crisis. In the 1970s, Nepal suffered from large commodity concentration and a high geographic centralization in its export trade: over 98% of its exports were to India, and 90% of its imports came from India. As a result of all this, Nepal had a poor trade bargaining position. Because of these problems, and Nepal's inability to develop its own infant industries (as it could not compete with Indian manufactures) treaties were drafted in 1960 and 1971, with amendments to the equal tariffs conditions, and terms of trade have since progressed.

In August, 2003, the International Ministerial Conference of Landlocked and Transit Developing Countries and Donor Countries on Transit Transport Cooperation (Almaty Ministerial Conference) was held in Almaty, Kazakhstan, setting the necessities of LLDCs in a universal document whereas there were no coordinated efforts on the global scale to serve the unique needs of LLDCs in the past.